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The Scourge
The Scourge is the name the people of Oraclos assigned the banishment of the rebellious Gharmhyrr that killed Mira and the subsequent war. Events leading to the war After the first attack against Mira, the Goddesses chose to distance themselves from the humans. In their place, they left Cassius Theron as king of Oraclos. They ordered him to unite the kingdom under their faith by building temples; however, as he carried out his duties, this bolstered the resentment of the Goddesses' enemies to the point that they vowed to kill him. Unbeknownst to them, the Goddess Mira had been secretly following Cassius the entire time, watching over him and protecting him in times of peril. So, when their plan finally came to fruition, she stood in their way and they accidentally ended up killing her instead, enraging Ora. Banishment "The skye becomed as blak as nyght, bote no steorren schane thoru the veil. Alle were silent, makked so par the awe of that which hath happed. The crickets bi-lan their chirping, the leaves dwelled in the trees, and forrthen the wind stilled of mournful affection. Mira layd to the ground, her face pesible as if she were slumering. No blod tached the pament, an the ribaudes' swerden were clene. Non wolde hath bi-sed her ded tweren't for the uncuth stillness. Thane a bolt of whyte leit split the erthe. The ground tremled, and lang flambes cercled the goddess-sleeres, aresting their flight. Alle withinnen the flambes was swelwed by the nether, Mira's cors forrthen. Ora's voys thonord abouen, the wyght of her brethe forcefil bi-hinde her wordes. 'Thou hath bi-trayed Us. We granted alle to thee, thy lyf, thy thankes, thy verray estre, and yet thou hath wasted it alle. Annentisshed! Sentenles beestes, alle of ye! Wrytheth in the flambes of Justice, and suffereth thy eche damnation!' She denounced as soche, and then alle was agon. Vanished. Oonli asches dwelled wher Mira ones lay, and Cassius, fore it, hid his ilete stoon-stille." - Anonymous oral account The Interim In spite of the public belief that the war started immediately after Ora left Oraclos, there was a two year decline before the first incident which would start the war. Without Ora's grace to bless the land, the humans were left to fend for themselves. They noticed a change in their quality of life such as the water was now contaminated, there was a drop in quality and quantity of crops, and diseases were starting to spread. Also, even with the church insisting that the goddess had not left them and was merely watching from a distance as she had been, the idea that the goddess did not care for them was catching and people were throwing away their faith. Cassius had never been challenged in this way before. He could only provide care for the symptoms and not the root cause of the issue, cursed land. He prayed to Ora every day to return to them but didn't hear a word in reply. And then the first tear appeared. The First Tear As it has been passed down in oral accounts, a tear in the sky appeared over a cabbage field in Leah Valley. It assumed the guise of a swirling, purple cloud. A couple of farm hands investigated it, and when they did, a trio of "bodily misshapen half-wolves" appeared. The farm hands were quickly murdered and the wolves escaped into the hills with their money and some cabbages. Word of the "tear" and the "monsters" spread and soon reached Zephyr Borreau who brought it to Cassius' attention. Cassius called for a "hunt" and reached out to Wolfrick Greyson, creating the king's special task force Raseri and sending them to assist Zephyr and catch the monsters. He also assigned a group of scholars to research the tear, sending Flodene Puanani with them to relay the results to him personally as he wanted to keep it as confidential as he could. The monsters were caught quickly and brought before the king. They refused to give Cassius any information about who they were, how they got there, or what their goals were. Without knowing what else to do and to please an increasingly anxious public, Cassius had them executed. Then, Flodene reported the scholar's findings. The purple cloud was a joining in the space between Oraclos and the underworld which Ora had cast the cursed traitors, Miraclos. They attributed the anomaly to the lack of Ora's grace, and since her lingering presence was diminishing, so to was the faith the people had in her, thereby causing her grace to deplete more rapidly. With her grace nearly gone, that meant that the only thing keeping Miraclos and Oraclos from rejoining was an unknown power, and soon the cursed traitors would have the run of the land. There also had been reports of more tears appearing, and monsters already pouring in. Some were the original traitors, and others were beasts created solely from this unknown power and the hatred the original cursed bore the Orans. Cassius had no choice and declared war on the invading monsters. Desecrated Temple Dourmire While the enemy's numbers steadily grew, so did the damage done to Oraclos. One of the greatest losses Oraclos suffered was Temple Dourmire. Oraclos was not prepared for fighting, so they had to form an army while battling the enemy. Because of this, the temples were unprotected for a time. Lykaios' army was focused mainly in Lykaios Woods, where most of the towns were. However, Temple Dourmire was located in the Nyctimus Moor, near the mountains, and only a few volunteers ventured there to look after it. However, by the time they got there, they found it had already been sieged and reduced to rubble. The bodies of its priests were lost to the waters, and the statues of the Goddesses were desecrated, their heads missing and the bodies smothered in dirt and 'other unmentionable materials'. When Cassius heard of the temple's destruction and the sorry state the statues were found in, he burned with shame and embarrassment. With renewed purpose, he continued to pray to the Goddess and command his army. On the other hand, Wolfrick took the fall of Dourmire as a personal challenge (as he had been instrumental in its construction) and with Raseri hunted down its attackers, committing the same atrocities to them as they had done to the temple's statues. Although some zealous priests try to attribute this as a turn in Wolfrick's attitude towards the goddesses, most scholars and priests accept that this was merely an act of vengeance for his damaged pride as he had helped to build the temple as well as it being close to his home and therefore encroachment into his territory. A Goddess' Boon After nearly a year of praying to the goddess, Ora finally appeared before Cassius. Their interaction was private, but there have been many imaginative retellings of her words to him, the most famous being: "Mine owen favor to thee, Hero King, who smitest the Wrongwis fram theos weorld. I impart unto thee theos stoon as a menes to bul-bringest upon tham mine Judgment. Callest upon mine poer and ful-endist thoes Scourge." In this meeting, Ora bequeathed Cassius the Calling Stone, a means to call upon her to grant him power. With the stone, Cassius found a way to return Ora's blessing to the land. As a test, he lit a candle, but even that left him bedridden for a week. He, a mortal, could not use a goddess' power. During his rest, Cassius devised his plan for restoring his people's faith and dividing the power of the Goddess, The Ritual of Partitions. He traveled the kingdom and appointed his guardians in a flashy ritual to appease his subjects. With the goddess supposedly returning to them, the people were inspired to continue to fight the monsters. The Final Battle With all of his guardians appointed, Cassius left them to protect the temples. However, there was no way the monsters would have ignored the fact that the tides were beginning to turn. Knowing that they would soon attack the castle to quell any rising hope, Cassius returned to Duela. Wolfrick returned with him, as he had no temple to protect. Cassius' instinct was correct and he almost immediately received word that large groups of monsters were starting to form. He readied defenses what defenses he could and within the next few days, the attack began. It was not as many as he had expected, mostly made of the beasts of corruption, but the beasts were powerful. They easily did away with barricades and walls. However, with the Goddess' powers, Wolfrick and Raseri countered the beasts. Meanwhile, Cassius was inside, entrusting Wolfrick and his soldiers to fend off the beasts while he prepared a ritual. Since the power of a goddess was still too great, he had had to set up conduits, a ring of stones of a similar quality to the calling stone, to absorb any excess energy before he enacted his plan. When it was complete, he called on Ora's power to rip open holes in the space between Miraclos and Oraclos and expel the monsters. After, he would repair the barrier to keep them from returning. However, this was too great a feat even with his cautionary measures, and the strain killed him. They say that Wolfrick was the one that found him in a room behind the throne room, laying in the middle of the circle of white stones and a pool of his own blood, and his woeful baying could be heard echoing across the battlefield. Legacy Cassius was known from then on as Oraclos' first and greatest king, its Hero King, and a legend was passed down that Cassius' final words to Wolfrick were that if his kingdom were ever facing destruction, he would return and protect it, always. The Scourge also was the origin of The Ritual of Partitions as well as tales of Mirans becoming monsters due to corruption. And, since the Scourge, any paranormal or unexplainable happening was labeled the work of monsters. There also have been many fictional works based on the Scourge including a tragic play detailing Cassius' life, various books claiming romances between Cassius and various of his guardians (most often Wolfrick or Flodene, but some even claim he was the lover of the Goddess herself), and even tapestries showing his various heroic feats. Many famous paintings and sculptures were made in Cassius or the Guardians' honor, the most famous being the statue of Cassius Theron overlooking King's Circle. Temples Zephrum and Gaium were renamed to honor the first guardians for their heroism and contributions to the kingdom (previously having been named Galecutter and Strongoak respectively). Because of Cassius' performances during the Ritual of Partitions, the popular, albeit incorrect, belief that Ora did not abandon Oraclos and instead was watching from afar took root and eventually became the teaching of the Oran church. If one implied that Ora had abandoned Oraclos at all, they were immediately labeled a heretic and ostracized. After Cassius' death, Wolfrick was appointed the title of king. He was reluctant to accept but did so after convincing from Marisol and Flodene. However, he kept up his other job of commanding Raseri and often went on hunts for straggling monsters. It was during one of these hunts that he was killed and Radcliffe Montesano inherited the throne after him. During his short term, Wolfrick was known as "The Heretic King" because, in spite of performing holy rituals and being seen in the temples, it was widely known that he did not truly believe in any of the teachings. Some priests claim that it was his heresy that led him to his early death. Others believe that the church sent agents to kill him because they didn't like a nonbeliever on the throne and knew that if he were gone, Radcliffe (a devout worshipper of the goddess) would naturally be the next in line. Category:History